Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
Switzerland hosts many international organizations that promote
peace and human rights worldwide.
The Swiss are proud of their country's reputation for neutrality.
However, Switzerland also produces and sells weapons
to countries in conflict and that violate human rights.
Critics of the arms trade are trying to stop it
through a binding referendum on November 29.
First, to save human lives. Swiss arms also kill.
If they wouldn't kill, nobody would buy them.
Secondly, in our constitution, there are some principles,
like to help to develop poor countries, to help to develop human rights,
to help peace processess.
That's stupid. That's a contradiction.
Lang says that the Swiss Confederation spends 180 million francs
to help the same developing countries that buy about
150 million francs worth of Swiss arms a year.
That means that, at the end, there is more
destruction than construction.
Our largest customer last year was Pakistan,
a country which is involved in an armed conflict
and which greatly violates human rights.
This year, the second largest customer of our arms industry is Saudi Arabia,
also a large abuser of human rights.
We don't think that it is okay for Switzerland to help those regimes
to defend themselves against democratic opposition.
In 2006, the Swiss company Pilatus sold a plane to Chad,
saying it was for military training purposes.
The Group for a Switzerland Without Arms
urged the government not to approve this deal,
and they were right to do so: the Chad government armed
the plane and used it to bombard civilians in Darfur.
That was contrary to the contract.
So they didn't respect the contract.
Abuse at the end of the day is always possible.
Everything can be abused.
Also a knife can be abused, but you never would
stop the production of knives.
Swissmem represents more than 1,000 companies
from the metallurgical, metallic and electronic industries.
This initiative is unnecessary because the laws
in Switzerland are quite tough.
Switzerland has some of the strictest arms export laws in the world,
at least on paper.
The Chad plane incident is not an isolated example.
Both the government and main business federation say
that forbidding arms exports would
endanger national security.
Switzerland has a long tradition of defending itself,
and we are a country which is proud to have a military
and all of this tradition of defending our neutrality,
and if we want to defend ourselves, we have to have weapons,
and if we say we have to have weapons, we also want
at least a part to be produced here in Switzerland.
If voters approve the ban, Switzerland wouldn't be able
to export arms, but could still make them for its own use.
The industry says it would not be able to survive.
Today it's much more the question of everything or nothing.
If the people would really say yes to the initiative,
I think that would be the death of the whole
arms industry in Switzerland.
Arms exports account for less than 0.1% of the total Swiss GDP.
This means that for every 100 Swiss francs of wealth
produced in the country, only 11 cents come from arms exports.
But a government-funded study predicts the loss
of at least 5,000 jobs.
It would not be a drama for the country, it would be a drama for
some selected regions,
because arms production is not spread evenly over the whole country.
There are a few concentrations, and unfortunately,
these concentrations are more in rural areas
where probably it is more difficult to find a job.
I understand the sorrows of the people who are actually
affected by the ban, but in fact the arms industry
in Switzerland is not big.
It is about as important as the industry
that produces wooden windows. So it is tiny.
This is the third time in 30 years that
the Swiss will vote on banning arms exports.
If the economy were better, the referendum might have
a chance of success.
But polls show it will fall short of the majority it needs to pass.